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Elvis Box Relives 1956 – Goldmine Magazine

Sep 06, 2011

Due for release September 27 on RCA/Legacy, Young Man With The Big Beat – a five-CD extravaganza with book, ’56 Elvis timeline, full-size poster replicas and other hoopla – presents his every studio release (including two LPs’ tracks) from the year on two discs. A third CD contains three concerts; a fourth, studio outtakes; and the fifth, interviews.

Given how few interviews he did throughout his career and his not having been a letter writer, we don’t have a lot of Elvis in his own words, so the interviews are especially welcome. He speaks admiringly of Frank Sinatra and recalls a cherished car. The boy from the housing projects is happy that his mother can now go into a store and buy whatever she wants.

As for the controversy he unintentionally generated, Jackson once told Goldmine, “He was terribly hurt. He just couldn’t believe that people thought of him as being vulgar.” But in these interviews he reserves his anger for the naysayers’ trashing of the screaming girls in his audience. He’s tough-skinned and open-minded about people not liking his music. It’s the ugly potshots at his fans that he won’t accept. The human being emerging from the interview tapes seems like a pretty decent guy.